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Comments (29)

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  kepano
  I'm not sure why it popped up today, but it's nice to see it on HN again! A brief timeline with some links to past discussions:- 2022: The .canvas open format was created for Obsidian Canvas [0].- 2024: Official 1.0 spec of JSON Canvas [1].- 2024-2025: A number of apps/libraries built up around conversion, storage, and import/export [2].- 2026: Obsidian Skills [3] includes support for .canvas (along with .md and .base) to make it easy for LLMs to read/write JSON Canvas, and opens interesting visualization/interaction patterns with agents.[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34066824[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39670922[2]: https://jsoncanvas.org/docs/apps/[3]: https://github.com/kepano/obsidian-skills
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  bryanrasmussen
  It would be useful to have examples of data and the representation this would result in.Although you can go to https://jsoncanvas.org/ itself and see an example rendering, you cannot see the exact data that created it - I think, although you can sort of guess since the element names are stuff like node.I sort of doubt this is the best data structure for representing this kind of thing. Maybe I'm wrong though but I would think I would go for something like https://github.com/jsongraph/json-graph-specification which strikes me as closer to graphml which I have some experience with, and maybe give it ability to embed videos etc. (which for all I know someone already has)This is all an initial feeling though, like hmm, no I think it's wrong, and maybe I am just not seeing why this would be better than another solution.
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  mort96
  I feel like this page does a good job of telling me nothing. It's a representation of a graph? Where each node can be a text string or a file or a URL or a container of other nodes? And somehow these links and files and containers have a color? What is the purpose of this? Why would I want my file to be blue?
• jessmartin
  Really cool to see JSON Canvas getting attention. (Hi, kepano!) It was one of the inspirations for OCIF (Open Canvas Interchange Format), which we've been working on since JSON Canvas came out.JSON Canvas nails the simplicity-it's easy to read and easy to implement. We wanted to build on that spirit while tackling some of the challenges showing up in this thread: nested canvases, extensibility for custom app data, text styling, coordinate systems, and round-tripping between different canvas apps without data loss.OCIF v0.7.0 just came out. It's designed to be an interchange format — so different canvas tools (Excalidraw, TLDraw, Obsidian, etc.) can export/import each other's canvases.Some highlights:- Extensible: apps can attach their own data via extensions, so nothing gets lost even if the features aren't supported- Nested canvases via parent-child node relationships- Local coordinate systems (addresses the pixel positioning concerns raised in another comment here)- Text styling, viewport control, and more via built-in extensionsIf JSON Canvas isn't quite meeting your needs, OCIF[1] might be worth a look.https://canvasprotocol.org
• whycombinetor
  Previously posted in 2022 as Obsidian Canvas before being open sourced in 2024 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34066824
• anon
  undefined
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  atentaten
  I don't use canvas in Obsidian. Tried it when it was released, but haven't used it since. I like Obsidian and want to get the most out of it. I'm curious as too how folks are using canvas in Obsidian.
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  StilesCrisis
  Why use this instead of SVG?
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  obsidianbases1
  I've used canvas quite a bit since it was release in Obsidian. It's good, not great, but the simplicity of the file type opens up a lot of opportunities to build on top of it.
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  Garlef
  I'm not sure about this:An "infinite" canvas without some notion of recursion such as viewports feels incomplete.
• makeitrain
  Looks cool. I recently hit some limits with mermaid and this seems a little more flexible.
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  MoonWalk
  Are pixels really the best way to encode position at this point?